17 year old out of control son with ADD

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Turning the anger into a useful tool
by: JackieJ

Your don't mention your own anger and frustration and (as a person over age 50 who has spent a lifetime learning how to live well with ADHD - most members of my family have it, as I do) it is important to see ADHD not as a disability, but a strength, and then use the strengths to remove the roadblocks causing the frustration/anger.

The anger isn't from not getting help, it is from feeling trapped, and as if nothing can possibly get any better. It can, with a good plan (hard for us with ADHD) and action (what we're good at).

See if you can have a calm, honest, adult-to-(almost)adult conversation with your son. Tell him, honestly, how ADHD has affected your life. Ask for his help - does he see ways that you and he as a team could problem-solve, using ADHD strengths such as creativity, good ideas, thinking-outside-the-box, energy, passion?

Think of this as starting to build the relationship you want to have with your adult son - much different than 'dealing' with an angry teenager. My son and I fought through his teen years, and it was awful. And very hard to build some tentative bridges (but we have) to a point where we have a pleasant (but not as close as I would like) relationship now - he is now 27 and living a good life but was, not so long ago, very, very angry.

I have said here what I wish someone had said to me when he was an 'acting up' 9-year-old and that is, value the person, don't focus on the anger, it's just a symptom.

You have some very real, tough issues, but the relationship with your son is the most important, and the one YOU have the power to change.

I wish you the best - and will be looking for your update on this site

17 year old out of control son with ADD

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17 year old out of control son with ADD